10....Lenin Shipyards, Gate 2

Before I left Warsaw I just HAD to visit on of the city's institutions...E. Wedel's Chocolate House. I had the most heavely chocolate gateau....melt in the mouth chocolate mousse on a base of crunchy macaroon, encosed in a thin shell of dark bitter choc, and topped with an alcohol soaked cherry, all served with whipped cream! And to drink with it Hot Chocolate like you have never drunk before..not powdered stuff in milk...this was REAL chocolate melted into it's liquid base and blended with just a touch of cinnamon. Heavenly overdose!!!!!

But now I'm sitting in one of Gdank's most up-to-date and fashionable clubs,

right in the centre of what was once the Lenin Shipyard...the one where in 1980 90% of the workforce formed a trade union called Solidarity, and a worker in his mid 30's became the leader of a movement that led to the downfall of the Soviet machine.

At the main gates I found that there was a small bus about to leave on a tour of the shipyard past and present, and decided to join....

The tour took us through the debris and decay that is now most of what is left of Gdank's once thriving shipyards.

It's just waiting to be razed to the ground and redeveloped (but there are problems, and serious quistions about the stability of the ground and whether it can bear the weight of the shyscrapers they want to put there) It's not all doom and gloom though, having accepted financial help from the EU, part of the shipyard is still active...

and as well as shipbuilding it is planned that the Gdansk shipyard will be of of the main european centres for the manufacture of  giant wind turbines for use in coastal waters. They are also holding on to the history of Solidarity, and one of the places preserved as a monument is Lech Walensa's workshop (he was the shipyard worker who led the union, and eventually became president of Poland).

I'll be finding out more about Solidarity over the next few days, getting my laundery done, swimming in the sea, and visiting Hell (sorry, Hel...a small holiday resort near here).

9: ...and the rain it raineth everyday (well nearly)

So, here I am in Warsaw, and it's raining again. No , correct that, it's not raining, someone has turned on a tap and a river is pouring down out of the low grey sky...the clouds are so low that even the top of Stalin's Wedding Cake is shouded in cloud, and that's not high!

My first full day in Poland's capital was spent....wasted....searching for a launderette. I found the address of one on the internet, located it on the map, and off I went. It was a long way out of the centre, right to the end of one of the bus lines, then about half an hour's walk...then I discovered that the address wasn't a house number on a street, it was the number of a tower block on an estate...so I spent another half hour wandering around until I found block 21! The place had been closed down gfor some time....no one had bothered to remove the web site! Out of the only 4 launderettes I could locate in Warsaw I had to choose the one that was closed (maybe they all were!).

This is a strange city, it appears to be the usual mix (as in most cities) of historic centre and more modern outskirts....then, as you walk the streets and read the information you come to realise that this is in fact a facade, a giant con-trick (or if you prefer, a giant historical reconstruction).

90% of the city was razed to the ground by the end of WW2. What we see now is the result of detailed reconstructions based on old plans of the city and paintings by artists like Cannaletto. It's not until one looks closely at a detail and sees the date inscribed that one realises just how successful this has been...

It certainly has the feel of an old city...especially in the tourist heart, where the castle and the surrounding old squares would fool anyone unaware of the history of the place.

On the flip side of this, there are some remarkable examples of modern architecture, none more so than the new University Library.....this is a building I could live with in any city. Inside there is a giant green passageway throught the building, full of plants and light (in this case, light is everywhere, much of it natural light, the architect made full use of light wells and other devices that bring daylight into the heart of a building. What is even more remarkable is that outside the building there is a park (not so remarkable?) that starts as something quite ordinary (if rather beautifully lanscaped)and then continues up the walls of the library itself...

and onto the roof of the building....

.....open to everyone, this garden is a delight, and offers glimpses into the library itself.

Actually, there is a kind of irreverence that exists around some of Warsaw's most prestigeous (academic) buildings. Part of the National Library is housed in the former Krasinski Palace, outside which a herd of brightly coloured Pegasi graze...

And the Collegium Nobilium (the first school for the sons of the nobility, and now the acadamy of Dramatic Arts) has a giant hand perched over it's door!

This is in marked contrast to the "Socialist Realist" monumental works left over from the communist era...chunky earnest heros of the working class immortalised in stone or concrete...

...although noticably, the female figures are a little less in touch with reality as they're all draped in classical greek style robes!

By Wednesday the skies were once more clear, so I took myself off to the park ...well, one of the parks, there must be well over 20 parks in Warsaw itself, not counting those that run into the city from the outskirts. The one I vsited was Park Praski, site of the Warsaw zoo. I had no intention of visiting that particular establishment, but discovered that as an advertisment for the zoo, one of the exhibits is actually situated right on the public highway, with nothing between the public, cars and trams but a small wall and a ditch.

People stop as they walk by, throw all sorts of "food" to the bears, although I noticed very little rubbish in their pit (either vandalism hasn't reached the level of that in the UK or there is a high level of respect for the animals...I suspect the former). The bears themselves seemed bored by the whole thing.

A little further into the park I was extremely happy to discover one of the animals I'd been hoping to see in Poland...not in a cage, but living in the trees and every bit as human firendly as our grey ones...

...although I was extremely frustrated by the attitude of those people passing through who thought it was OK for a small child to keep chasing one of these creatures until it was terrified and desperatly trying to hide (the child was preventing it from reaching a tree).

Since the demise of the Communist State many monuments have sprung up around the city, to those killed in the East, the Katyn Forest dead, the Heroes of the Warsaw Uprising in 1944

But it's also very interesting to see that the story of what happened to the Jews of the city in the years before that is something the Poles would prefer to forget. At the outbreak of war 30% of the cities population was Jewish. At the end it was 6%, and of those most were chased out in the Communist purges of 1968. There is now only 1 functioning Synagogue. The Jewish Historical Institute keeps it's doors locked until a visitor identifies themself ( the signpost to the Institute had been torn down...one of the most blatant acts of vandalism I saw in the city).

The Warsaw Ghetto itself was totally destroyed and a vast housing estate was built in it's place by the Communist authorities, so the Ghetto monuments exist in the middle of a quiet residential area, but whereas there are numerous signposts to the other monuments, it would be difficult to find these ones without help. The Ghetto memorial itself is built from the stones the Nazis had intended to use for their vicory monument.

As one walks along the streets of the Ghetto memorial walk there are large blocks of stone set into the pathway with the names of some of the heros of the Ghetto, people who by their own lives made a difference to others.

The memorial to the leaders of the 1943 Ghetto Uprising is in many ways more impressive in it's simplicity,

But the most chilling was the memorial at the site of the railay loading platform, where people were packed into the cattle trucks that took them to Treblinka.

I'm still not sure of my own emotions around this place, I know that when I first saw it all, I wanted to cry but whether that was for the personal sense that here was all the memorial that much of my family would ever have, or whether it was in simple response to the horror of what went on here...and out of respect to those people who stood up and let theier lives have meaning in spite of it all, I don't know. Maybe it was a mixture of them all. What I do know is that shortly after I had my feelings about Warsaw's attitude to this part of it's history confirmed.

There is one small corner of the Ghetto still standing, unreconstructed and derelict this half a street stands as a silent reminder of what the Ghetto must have been like for all those thousands of souls crowded into it's restricted space.

The walls of this street have been partially covered with sepia portraits of some of the people who lived and died here. It is bleak, but beautiful, and perhaps a more fitting monument than the formal ones. And yet...as I was taking photographs I was approached and interviewed by a camera team. In just a few months this quiet corner is set for a complete change. The city of Warsaw has decided the buldings are dangerous and out of keeping with the neighbourhood, so they are to be "tastefully" renovated and given a new life as offices and cafes. The street won't be destroyed, it will be carefully "preserved". Perhaps it is fitting that life should continue as normal in this tiny corner of what was once a prison in all but name, yet I think something very important will be lost when that happens, and I don't think that what will then be lost can be replaced.....but as someone I met recently ( here in Poland) said " here it has to be swept under the carpet, if they can pretend it didn't happen they are happier" Perhaps the Poles have enough to cope with, with their own recent history of  occupation and "Heroic Resistance"so that to envisage the same happening to another people within their own cities is too much for them to bear. I don't know, but here in Warsaw, the history of the Jews sits very precariously alongside that of the Poles.

8:...Warsaw!

From the train it was possible to see just how much damage had been done by the heavy rains and flooding of the past few days. In many rivers and streams there was a mass of debris including, in some cases, whole trees. Some river banks had obviously collapsed , and there was a swathe of river mud along the edges of the flood plain in many places. In some fields there were large areas of standing water, and it was obvious that valuable crops had in some cases been lost.

Watching from train windows one gets little snapshot images of places that are gone before one has really had time to register them....Locomotives with snowploughs attached in a siding; giant hemlocks growing by a stream; a strip of sunflowers down the middle of an otherwise ploughed up field; children waving at the train; a group of young men chatting on a street corner, one of them wearing a tuba round his body; goats, turkeys, chicken, sheep, a bird of prey hovering, cows; a vast landfill site; huge fields split into strips (possibly a hold-over from when the giant collective farms were split up amongst the people who used to work them).

The first train, from Zakopane to Krakow is a clapped out, old, local, stopping train...tatty but reasonably comfortable. The second train, from Krakow to Warsaw is a totally different experience, ultra modern intercity, climate controlled, clean,and posh. The carriages are divided into compartments like in old british trains, just 6 seats to a compartment with a corridor down one side. There's even a special compartment for families with small children with less seats, a baby changing platform and special decorations.

So, that was my birthday....another year older....another city!

The hostel in Warsaw is run by Zielone Mazowia (Green Mazovia) an environmental group working here in Warsaw. It's housed in an old 19th century apartment block built around a central courtyard and well. It was once quite a posh place, now it's shabby, but the plasterwork on the ceilings gives away it's former genteel status. Nearby there are ultra modern tower blocks...huge international hotels....offices....

...there's also the massive Central Station complex with a maze of underground walkways (apparantly even Warsovians find it hard to negotiate) and a modern shopping mall, the usual thing except for it's fantastic waved glass roof, I loved the way the reflections played with the light and the sky...

...almost opposite that is the building that locals call Stalin's Wedding Cake...

....built in 1955 it was Stalin's "gift" to the people of Warsaw, and is actually the former "Palace of Culture and Science", everyso often someone tries to get rid of it, but it's still there as a reminder of the Soviet occupation of the country. Just at the foot of the vast eyesore there's a reminder of a different occupation of the city. Embedded in the pavement I found a double bronze line with writing in between, and realised I was crossing into what had once been the Jewish Ghetto.

Tired after the travelling yesterday, and not prepared to venture further into the city without first examining the maps and guides more closely, I decided to walk back to the hostel, finding as I did a novel way in which the city has comemmorated the 200th anniversary of the birth of the composer Frederic Chopin.

7:....there was something missing this morning!

There was something wrong when I woke up this morning, something was missing!.......Ah yes, no rain! I jumped (in slow motion, naturally) out of bed, and flung open the curtains (well, pulled then gently back, a fling would probably bring them down)...the sun was shining! The air was clear and fresh. OK so the stream next to the hostel was still flowing at express rate and dangerously full, but still...NO RAIN!. The morning TV was full of evidence that the rains have indeed caused serious damage to infrastucture with bridges down and roads washed awaqy in places, and there are some areas where they've got problems with homes flooded and crops and livestock washed away (you don't need to understand Polish to understand the film clips) However here we've escaped lightly being relatively high up.

Taking advantage of the fine weather I headed into town and to the market. After nearly a week of Polish cooking I was in DESPERATE need of fresh vegetables and fruit (don't get me wrong, the food is good and plentiful, it just doesn't run to fresh fruit and veg and depends largely on potatoes, grains and meat). Walking past the cheese stalls on the market.......

I found some wonderful fruit and vegetable stalls , freshly picked field and woodland mushrooms and fungi (no I don't know which is which)...

...raspberries, blackberries, strawberries, blueberries, aronia, cranberries (the little european ones not the big american ones), hazelnuts...I loaded up on fresh stuff for cooking tonight and happened to turn around and look up. 

The rain had had a very different effect higher up! So I rushed back to the bus station, and headed back to Kuznice and up the cable car again (what a difference a few days make, no queue this time!) to the top where there was heavy SNOW.

I didn't walk far...in fact I stepped off the path, which was rather slippery where people had been walking on it since early morning, and went straight up to my knees in drift.....

....and my stick hasn't got snow tips. Actually, I was quite surpised by the casual attitude of some of the people up there, improperly dressed for the weather ...high heels!?...crop tops...!?....shorts....!? I was told later that it's quite a problem here. Although the mountains are relatively small they are quite treacherous, amd around 30 people a year die in accidents, largely due to carelessness. 

Still, I got some good pics before retreating for a cup of Herbata and heading back down again.

6...and the rains came down!

Before I go back to my very pleasant, if somewhat wet, walk in the forest I should take some time to discuss the weather. It's been raining here in Poland for over a week now, with the worst affected area being right where I am...60mm rain just yesterday. I can tell by the levels of water in the stream by the hostel that things are getting bad, and on the news they have serious faced reporters standing next to swollen rivers, talking earnestly about the weather and mentioning places like Zakopane (which is where I am) and Krakow (the nearest city, where there were serious floods earlier this year, through which I have to travel on Saturday). They are showing maps of the watershed, with all the rivers leading into the main regional one running through Krakow...BUT I can't understand more than one word in one hundred so I don't know what they are saying...it's very confusing, and more than a little alarming!

While we are on the news, the other thing I've been seeing a lot of on the TV is "Solidarity" the trade union whose strikes eventually led to the downfall of the Communist state in Poland, and whose leader, Lech Walensa became one of independent Poland's first premiers. Gdansk (where I will be in less than two weeks) has just been hosting big National celebrations...it's 30 years since the strikes! I never realisised how long ago it was, I can remember clearly visiting Polish friends of my family and seeing a little shrine with photos of the Polish Pope (Jan Pawel they call him here) and Lech Walensa on either side. So, that's another thing to do when I get there...they're doing "Soldarity tours"  round the old ship yards.

Back to the here and now (well two days ago really, I've stayed in after being soaked through to the skin yesterday morning....with my waterproofs on) and my walk in the Tatra National Park. It was only a short walk, about one hour altogether, but beautiful.

I walked alongside a small stream, under tall pines with occasional birch and rowan trees. It smelled wonderful, damp peaty soil, wet leaves and slight sweetness that tells you there are fungi nearby. Although all the birds and animals had taken cover from the persistant rain there was plenty of evidence of their presence. Pine cones had been gnawed away, and trees had large woodpecker holes bored into them. I found fungi....

I found flowers....

and I found food!

The first living creatures I saw were swallows at a ford in the stream, doing their insect skimming act, but they were beaten hands (or should that be wings) down by a small, plain looking wagtail who performed the most amazing aerial acrobatic stunts  I have ever seen. Somersaults, backwards flying, sudden changes of direction, and by then I'd put away my camera because it was just getting too wet!

After that I retreated to town where I enjoyed myself finding the most expensive the most expensive foods on the menus (but not buying them) Locally hunted venison came in at the top, with locally hunted Wild Boar second. It's very clear though that the poles are used to hard weather by what's on sale, even as souveniers. Knitted goods, socks sweaters, hats and mittens are popular, so is anything sheepskin...waistcoats, slippers, blankets. Shops selling walking boots and wet weather gear are very popular as well. It's also noticable that nearly all the restaurants and cafes that can have open fireplaces...with a roaring fire, and Tea or Coffee with rum is on offer. An interesting thing here, the Poles appear to drink more tea (Herbata) than Coffee (Kawa). It's drunk black, sometimes with lemon, and in a tall glass not a cup. The only cups I've seen are for coffee, which comes small and black.

One thing you can't get away from, even in a small town like this, are the obvious tell tales of Globalisation Kentucky Fried Chicken, McDonalds and Costa Coffee all have large outlets on town, many of the banks are multinationals, and of course there are brand names everywhere..Nike, Levis ......but their facilities for the disabled are almost non-existant, or at best tokenistic (is that a word? ....it is now!)

I'm hoping that the weather forecasts are right and that there will be slightly better weather for my last two days here (slightly less rain....intermittant perhaps, if not full sunshine) I'd like to get out and see some more of the region......if I do, you'll be the first to know.

5: ...and sleet was blowing in all directions!

Add caption

So, finally I got a glimpse of what it's all about. Following my nose...the smell of multiple outdoor food outlets all busy grilling meat is quite unmistakeble....I found the main "market" area. It's like a giant craft market, with hand ( and machine) knitted goods in "local" wool, leather goods, sheepskinwares, embroidered goods, traditional felt slippers, local style shoes, and lots and lots of tat. Cheek by jowl with these stalls are all sorts of bars, cafe's, restaurants and entertainments and offers of carriage rides driven by men in traditional Tatra costume.

Once through all of this I found the base station for one of the area's funicular railways. It rises up to a ridge about 1100 metres above sea level, and only costs £4.00 return!

At the top there's a road along the ridge that rivals Blackpool's seafront! Souveniers including "have your photo taken with a "bear" or a mountain dog (the local version of a Saint Bernard)", try your skill at any number of adventurous pursuits....

....eat as much grilled meat as you can manage, buy whatever you like so long as it has "Zakopane" written on it, or (if your tastes don't run to the entertainment on offer) sit on a terrace and sip, beer or coffee, or tea (they drink more tea here than coffee) and look out over the valley and the panorama of the Tatra mountains in the distance.

As it was much clearer than it had been the previous day, I also took advantage of the opportunity to walk off the main road and into the forest a little, whre I found (and ,of course, ate) wild raspberries! Talking of eating, I saw wild mushrooms for sale again, and some very strange looking loaves and cakes (many of them grilled in little stalls, which I soon gathered was a type of local ewes milk cheese. It's grilled/smoked to preserve it and tasted very good (and it's cheap). Apparantly it's a favoured snack locally and you'll see people buying it by the bag full, or wandering around eating it hot with cranberry sauce (cranberries are also local, growing in the peaty soil on the slopes around the pine forests)

I thought I knew better than the guide book when it said "buy your tickets at the tourist office because there are often long queues" so I didn't bother.....big mistake. One and a half hours (apparantly that's a short wait, on really busy days the wait can be up to two and a half hours) queueing for the cable car to take me to the top of one of the nearby peaks. Kasparowy Wierch is at 1900 plus metres above sea level (about one fifth the height of Everest).

It takes two rides in a large capacity cable car to get there, but when you get there it's worth it. The views are breathtaking.

But it was cold (0 degrees, as opposed to 12 degrees at the base), and after just a very short while the clouds started to close in ....

.....and before I knew what was happening it was white out and sleet was blowing in all directions and I retreated back to the cable car station, and back down to the relative warmth (and heavy rain) at the base station, cursing all the while because if I had just paid attention to the guide book I'd have had a good hour of clear skies and good light.

In spite of the weather, however, and because it's a lot warmer further down, I decided to take advantage of the sign I noticed to one side of the cable car station..."Tatra National Park...entrance".

4. Mountain air...mountain dew (well, rain actually)

I've decided that I'll write about Krakow when I return for a week at the end of my journey, more time and more impressions. It will be interesting to see whether my first impressions are confirmed or contradicted.

Leaving Krakow I teamed up for a taxi with an English bloke who spoke even less Polish than me. A case of the blind leading the blind as I helped him buy a ticket to Kiev. But it worked both ways, he helped me with my suitcase...fair exchange.

It's a really interesting experience standing at a railway station waiting for a train when you can't understand any of the station announcements (not because of crackly sound this time, just language) and then realise that locals appear to be as frustrated and confused about the time tables as you are. At least I wasn't suffering alone, there was quite an international contingent on the platform......Dutch, Brazilian, Portuguese, and British, and we were all confused. Eventually the train arrived, and having checked it was the right one, I settled down. One stop later, an announcement and everyone gets off again! Much sign language and a helpful train official and I discover that the half of the train I'm in stops here, only the other half is going to Zakopane. So in the pouring rain I haul myself and my luggage up the platform, rboard the train and find a seat.

Once we're out of Krakow we pass through birch woodland, plots pf green, houses set apart in well worked gardens. I want to see more but it's all pretty much shrouded in rain. At one point, when the man sitting opposite me gets off, I change places so that I can travel forwards and see where I'm going...and the train reverses out of the station, so I'm still travelling backwards. I become aware that we're steadily climbing and that the countryside (that I can see through the rain) is gradually changing. Pines and birch trees mix, vast meadows with streams running through them; steep roofed houses, pathways through woodland leading to level crossings; a sudden long view of a plain a nd valley. Cows, tall thin stacks of hay on strange spiked wooden skeletons, electricity pylons (I've seen no evidence of wind or solar power here, unlike Germany) Beehives in an orchard.

Hostel Bristol (yes, I know!) is a vast mausolueum of a place. It puts me in mimd of a miniature version of the hotel in "The Shining" then I realise there are people here, not just ghosts. It must have been quite a posh holiday place in the communist era. It's all brown marble and slightly distressed paintwork. The dining room is huge with marble pillars and chandeliers. My own room is small, functional but comfortable...although the two loos and showers seem to be shared by all the people on this landing. No one here speaks English, although by now I have established a technique that involved me attempting to say a phrase, writing it dow, or pointing it out in my phrase book and a simple mixture of words, written information and mime for response...it seems to work. I discover that breakfast here is extra so book it for " tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow...."

When I wake up the rain has stopped and the air outside is fresh and clean, and I can hear the stream next to the hostel flowinf full of it's extra load. I take a walk into town and get my first hint of what lies beyond.